Taylor concedes top order struggles after Windies women’s series defeat

Veteran player Stafanie Taylor has admitted that West Indies Women have underperformed with the bat in their ongoing One Day International series against Sri Lanka Women.

The visitors recorded two narrow victories in the first two matches and hold an unassailable 2-0 lead heading into Wednesday’s final match at the National Stadium.

In the opening match, West Indies were bowled out for 230 chasing Sri Lanka’s total of 240 for six, while in the second game they were restricted to 194 in pursuit of 209 for victory.

Speaking after the final practice session on Tuesday, Taylor, who along with Jannillea Glasgow have been the team’s best batters in the series, conceded that the top order had been below par.

“We had starts from batters but just never really got to finish the game. I know coach always says that once you get a start, especially the top five batters, that if you do get a start, you should try and finish the game.

“I feel like in the first game I should have stayed there until the end; however, I did try but it was just an unfortunate and misjudged run out. In the second game I wanted to actually stay there and bat because it wasn’t many runs, just 200 runs,” Taylor said.

“We lost the two openers quite early, so in the middle we knew that [Shemaine] Campbelle, myself, and Chin [Chinelle Henry] had to take the team as deep as possible. I thought [Jannillea] Glasgow did really well to try and get us over the line, but she just ran out of partners.

“I think as a batting group we really need to regroup and come strong for tomorrow’s game,” she added.

Taylor said despite having lost the series, the West Indies were still intent on putting their best foot forward in Wednesday’s finale.

“We have a meeting tonight and as a group we’re going to discuss where we went wrong, where we need to improve and for tomorrow’s game we just have to come out and give it our all.

“I thought in the second game the bowlers did really well to restrict them to that low total and the effort is going to be needed from all three aspects: bowling, fielding and batting, so it’s just about putting all three together and hoping that we come out on top,” Taylor said.

(CMC)